I Remember
by kzingirl
Summary: After his death a mother reflects on the man that changed her daughter's life forever.


I remember the first time I saw him. The pain and the grief eating away at his distinctive features. The sadness in his eyes. My daughter's blood on his hands.  
  
I remember the first time I saw her apartment, all glass and blood. I wanted to blame him. I had to. I knew it wasn't his fault but the FBI was too big and impersonal. I needed something, someone, smaller. It couldn't be her, I loved her too much. He was the only other person that I knew in her life. He was the only one I could think to blame.  
  
I remember the first time she told me about him. It had been the night before their first case, the day they first met. She called, wanting me to know that she was going away for a few days. Her first case. Their first case. I knew she wasn't going alone so I asked about her partner.   
  
"He's supposed to be a brilliant criminal profiler."  
  
She was obviously hiding her true feelings behind her impersonal description so I pushed a little harder. Dana was a private person even as a child and it always took an extra effort to get her to say anything beyond what she thought you wanted to hear. She was a lot like her father that way.   
  
"Well he's... he's different. But not in a bad way he's just... I mean I only met him today so I don't really know yet. I'll let you know when I get back."  
  
I don't remember what she eventually told me but in the end it didn't matter. Even then I think I knew although I didn't realize it at the time.   
  
I remember the first time I realized how much he loved her. I was still in shock from seeing Dana like that, lying there with an endless array of tubes and wires looking so pale and almost... almost... I didn't even want to think about it. That was when he came in. He yelled at the nurse. He yelled at the doctor. And he yelled at the security guards as they pulled him away.   
  
All they saw was his anger but I knew the truth. I'd heard his pain when he told me that he'd lost her. I'd seen his sorrow when he tried to give me back her cross. But as they pulled him away I finally saw his fear. He was no longer an angry vengeful man. He was a scared child, lashing out desperately, doing all he could to avoid facing the terrible possibility that he might lose her. She wasn't just his partner or even a good friend. That kind of pain. That kind of fear. This was something more than that, something much deeper.  
  
I remember the first time I forgave him. Even though I knew he loved her I still blamed him for the pain his involvement in her life had caused. But after seeing him with her in the hospital while she was battling cancer I finally noticed it. Just watching him with her. Seeing how gentle and loving he was. The way her kissed her hand before he left.   
  
In the end though I think it was the guilt. The way he looked at her. The way he wouldn't look at Bill or I. The way he'd sit outside her room, as if he didn't deserve to see her. He blamed himself and he would have given anything, including his own life, to save her. I'm not sure what I would have done if I'd lost her but I did know what he would do. I knew he wouldn't be able to live without her.   
  
It was this realization that allowed me to accept his presence in her life. There was nothing he wouldn't do to protect her, to care for her. I wasn't sure if she was aware of this or how she felt about him but I was certain that if this was the life she was determined to choose I wouldn't want anyone else at her side.  
  
I remember the first time I realized that she loved him. It was after that tragic Christmas we spent at Bill Jr.'s in San Diego. Emily wasn't in her life for very long but she will always be a part of it. To find out that you have a child only to lose them without hope of another... I couldn't even begin to imagine what she was going through. I wanted to be there for her, to make it all better like I did when she was a child. But I honestly didn't know what to do.   
  
When he finally arrived I was actually relieved to see him. With everything they had been through together he was closer to her in a way I'll never be able to comprehend. Which is why I wasn't surprised that after Emily's funeral she chose to go with him, to turn to him. She would always love us but her place was with him now. He was the one she needed. He was the one she was in love with. He was the one.  
  
I remember the first time I was truly afraid. Barely 18, I discovered that I was pregnant. I just knew that my parents were going to kill me or at the very least Dad was going to kill Bill. But the fear I felt then didn't even compare to the terror that filled me when Bill shipped out for the blockade. At the time everyone thought that this was it, the war we had all dreaded had finally arrived and the father of my unborn child was going straight to the center of it all. What if something happened to him? What if he didn't come back? What would I do? Could I raise this child on my own? Could I ever love anyone else?   
  
When it was finally over it felt as if I had lived an eternity in a few days. But once Bill returned I was able to forget the questions that had plagued me for almost two weeks. I was going to be getting married. I was going to be starting a family of my own. Unfortunately this was not the way fate intended it for my daughter. Her eternity lasted much longer than mine and her ending was as tragic as mine was exultant.   
  
I remember the first time she told me. The phone rang in the middle of the night. I was certain it was bad news. Good news never comes in the middle of the night.   
  
She sobbed for almost two minutes before going eerily quiet. "I lost him." Her voice was barely above a whisper. I immediately thought back to my forgotten questions, questions that were now my daughter's reality.   
  
The fact that the exact origins of her pregnancy are unknown is incidental to the reality of what he was in her life. Whatever the genes of that child may say he would have been their father. There was no one else in her life. And while I might have been able to move on without Bill, that's simply not an option for her. This will be her only child and the only father they'll ever have will be her memory of him.  
  
The End 


End file.
